House Calls
by Almost Romantic
Summary: A blanket of fluff coats the entirety of Equestria, robbing the ponies of their magic! Without Celestia or Luna to help them, will the ponies be able to protect themselves against the oncoming threat?
1. Chapter 1

House Calls

A small yawn escaped from Spike's mouth, despite his efforts to suppress it. He shook his head, trying to keep himself awake.

"You can go on to sleep if you want to, Spike," Twilight whispered from her desk. "I'll be up late tonight."

"Aren't you tired, darling?" Rarity asked from her plush bean bag. "I'm so exhausted from putting up with that _Blueblood_," she spat, "that I could sleep for a year and a half."

Twilight magically snapped the book that she was reading with a small _thud. _"I'm sorry—am I keeping you up?"

Rarity smiled. "Not at all, dear. Fluttershy, on the other hand…" She trailed off, glancing beside her at the yellow pony.

Fluttershy lay on her own bean bag, her face lying on her front legs dejectedly. Her eyes were bloodshot and she kept sighing tiredly. "I'm fine. I doubt I'll sleep much tonight anyway," she said, her voice barely louder than a whisper.

Princess Celestia, after feeling guilty for making their night miserable for her entertainment, offered to teleport the ponies back to their home, since Twilight's magic carriage had turned back into an onion and the purple pony was too exhausted from the long night of greeting people to turn it into a carriage again. Unfortunately, Celestia was quite tired from the night's festivities ("Some festivities they were, even with you all helping them," the princess had said disdainfully. "I remember when the Gala used to be _fun._"), and she was only able to send three of them back to Ponyville. The remaining three ponies, with Spike in tow, headed back to Twilight's old home, the library. They had managed to cram all four of them in the small bedroom, which was no more than twenty feet square.

There was only one bed, so Fluttershy, Rarity, and Spike were lying on plush bean bags, which they had arranged in a loose circle, that had been stored in the top levels of the library, the storage section. Twilight had almost forgotten that they were there. Unfortunately for Rarity—but fortunately for Spike—there were only two extra bean bags, so Spike and Rarity took to sharing one. Spike's ears kept twitching nervously.

"Oh, Fluttershy," sighed Twilight. "Those animals aren't used to having anypony interact with them. They're scared of everypony, not just you."

Fluttershy didn't say anything.

"Not to mention, there was quite a lot of noise coming from the ballroom, with Pinkie making so much noise trying to get everypony else to dance," Rarity offered.

Fluttershy was still silent.

"Fluttershy, for the love of Equestria, you can't always have your cake and eat it, too," Spike said at a near-shout. "Animals love you, and just because a few of them at the Gala are scared of you doesn't mean that you're scary, or bad, or even relatively negative in any way. So, please, stop crying and sulking about it, and most of all, _get some sleep._ You'll need it for tomorrow." Spike grumbled slightly and then rolled over away from the ponies and feigned sleep.

"What's tomorrow?" Fluttershy asked shakily after a long, empty silence.

"I…" Rarity trailed off. "I don't know. However, he _is _right; we need to go to sleep. We're all tired enough as it is."

"Agreed," said Twilight, a little rattled by Spike's outburst. She disapproved of his methods, but there was no denying that his words were true.

"Goodnight," Rarity said, resting her head on her forelegs. She quickly fell asleep, her side brushing up against Spike's spines. The little dragon stiffened, blushing furiously. He doubted that he was going to sleep tonight.

Fluttershy, shaken but oddly calmed by Spike's outburst, quickly drifted off into sleep as well, leaving only Twilight and Spike awake. She bit her lip, trying not to giggle, as she saw Rarity's side brush up against Spike's back again, making the baby dragon squirm in both excitement and fear.

**~…~ **

Applejack grumbled as she slammed the door to the barn open, a gust of wind threatening to force it shut again. She went to the back and clomped up the stairs and to her 'room', which was simply a part of the hay loft with a straw bed, a nightstand, some shelves with a few trinkets on them, and a hook for her hat. She quickly shed her dress, arranged it as neatly as she could, folded it up, and put it in one of the drawers in her nightstand.

Applejack practically fell over onto her bed and onto her back, too tired to even cover herself with the sheets. She stared up and out of the skylight that Big Macintosh had installed for her on her birthday, sighing as she spotted the center star of Orion's belt in the direct middle of the skylight. She sighed, the tension from the night evaporating from her shoulders. She was asleep in mere seconds afterwards.

The star flashed briefly, and a distorted whooshing sound was faintly heard in the distance.

**~…~ **

Rainbow Dash kneaded a small cloud with her hooves and lay down, yawning and stretching her tired wing muscles. She rested her head on her forelegs and closed her eyes, yawning again. She didn't bother changing out of her dress, since it was already wrinkled and dirty from a long night of doing her best to impress the Wonderbolts.

Dash sighed. She hoped that they had at least been impressed with her speed and flying skills, and her night's efforts weren't in vain. She had tried her best to impress them, but they didn't notice her at all…

She sank down further into the cloud, its fluffy surface conforming to her shape. She smiled slightly, despite being so tired; no bed in the world could compare to sleeping on a cloud.

Suddenly, a distorted whooshing sound came from below, and a pulsating light illuminated the ground in a ten foot wide spot almost directly below Dash's cloud. Dash hung over her cloud, trying to get a better look. Soon, curiosity got the best of her, and she jumped off of the cloud, gliding down slowly to the spot where the light had been flashing; it had since stopped.

**~…~**

"Pinkie, will you be a dear and take out this bag of trash?" Mrs. Cake asked, dropping the bag in front of Pinkie as she tried to walk up the stairs to her room. Pinkie groaned and grabbed the bag with her teeth, doing her best to keep her tongue from touching the plastic of the bag. She nudged open the back door and slung the bag into the trash can, which was nearly twice as high as her shoulder.

As she nosed the door open again, she thought that she heard a whooshing sound coming from somewhere in the distance. She was about to trot over and investigate, but Mr. Cake called her back in. _Do those two _ever _sleep? _She thought to herself, sighing as she walked back inside.


	2. Chapter 2

**~…...~**

_The Next Day… _

A piece of white fluff landed on Luna's nose, making her want to sneeze. She gave her head a small shake, and the fluff drifted down to the ground. Puzzled, she used her magic to lift the fluff up close to her face. Upon closer inspection, she noticed that it wasn't a single piece of fluff, but rather a conglomerate object made up of dozens of tiny, smaller pieces of… something.

_That's odd, _she thought to herself. _It looks just like snow. _

The scientist inside her coming forth, she strode quickly to her quarters, still magically holding the oddity in front of her face. Once she was inside, she quickly closed the door and sent the piece of fluff over to her microscope. It sailed through the air, and then dropped to the floor, where it quivered in place. Puzzled, Luna sent another wave of magic at it, becoming worried when it jumped up about a foot and then floated slowly back down.

Becoming frantic, she picked the piece of fluff up with her hoof and placed it on the microscope slide. She tried to turn the focus knobs with magic, but to no avail—her magic was apparently useless—so she turned the knobs clumsily with her hooves. Once the oddity came into focus, she had to rub her eyes and make sure that what she saw was correct.

Thousands of tiny particles, all moving independently, made up the piece of fluff.

"That's not snow," she whispered.

**~…~**

Twilight yawned, stretching. She blinked a few times like an owl, and then stood up. None of her friends were up just yet. She glanced at the clock and sighed; it read a quarter past six. She had only gotten about five hours of sleep. The sunrise hadn't even started to light the sky.

Spike had somehow managed to bury his nose in Rarity's side while he was sleeping without her noticing—_perhaps it wasn't an accident, _she thought amusedly to herself. Rarity didn't seem to notice; her mouth hung open comically, resonating snores coming from her throat. Fluttershy had stayed in almost exactly the same position, except for her head being cocked to the side at an odd angle.

She picked her way slowly through her sleeping friends, opening the door silently with magic. She stepped outside and gasped, not bothering to close the door. A thick layer of snow had somehow accumulated over the night, despite it being nearly fifty degrees outside. Twilight took off at a hard gallop towards Celestia's castle, leaving a rooster's tail of snow in her wake.

**~…~ **

The royal castle in Canterlot had two main spires: one for each princess to raise their respective celestial body. Celestia stood on top of her spire, her horn glowing brilliantly, but nothing happening; not even a flicker of red or orange appeared on the eastern horizon no matter how hard she tried.

"Luna!" Princess Celestia screamed with both her voice and her mind. "Come here!"

Luna nearly dropped her test tube when the telepathic call from her sister resounded through her head. _Apparently _that_ still works, _she thought, flying as fast as she could to her sister's tower.

Luna could immediately see that the lack of magic had affected her sister—her mane wasn't flowing like it normally was, since it was kept free from gravity's pull by her magic. It lay on the ground in a tangled, sweaty mess as its owner strained intensely. And Luna had a good guess why: the fluff was falling heavily, like snow, and was blanketing every surface that she could see.

"It's no use, Celestia," Luna said softly to her sister, alighting by her side. "Something's blocking out all of our magic, except for a few things."

A flicker of accusation crossed Celestia's face, but it vanished nearly as soon as it appeared. "How do you know?" She didn't stop straining, her horn still glowing brilliantly.

"It's because of this fluff," responded Luna carefully; it was obvious that Celestia was suspicious that Luna made the fluff fall from the sky, despite the white Alicorn having renewed trust in her sister. "It looks like snow, and it's made up of tiny particles like snow, but it isn't snow. And it's blocking all of our magic."

Celestia hesitated for a moment, and then withdrew whatever magic that she had left in her horn, which promptly stopped glowing. "Alright, then. But how do we stop it? We have to have magic to function," she said, pawing the ground anxiously.

Luna sighed. "I wish I knew, sister."

**~…~ **

"Where'd he _go_?" Rainbow Dash muttered, hovering above the trees. She had spent what felt like all night chasing, looking for, and catching glimpses of an odd-looking pony that seemed to be looking for something. She landed, panting; sleep deprivation and exhaustion had begun to catch up with her hours ago, but she didn't let it get to her. She simply _had _to find the weird-looking pony.

"Looking for someone?" Chirped a happy voice.

Dash spun around. "Who're you, and why are you wandering around in the middle of the night?"

Before her stood a tan colt with brown, spiky hair. An hourglass adorned his flank. He was leaning casually against a tree, a goofy smile on his face. "I'm the doctor, and if I may answer a question with a question, what're _you_ doing wandering around in the middle of the night?" His voice had an odd accent, one that was scarcely seen in Ponyville. Dash wondered if Rarity had picked up her accent from the one that this… doctor… had.

"I… I was just curious," Dash said defensively.

The 'Doctor' smirked. "Curiosity killed the catabron," he said, walking away.

"What's a… cata-thing?" Dash said, running after him. "Hey, where are you going? Come back here!"


	3. Chapter 3

**I own neither the Doctor Who franchise, My Little Pony, nor characters from either. **

"Somepony had better explain—"

The Doctor burst into giddy laughter, interrupting Dash mid-sentence. He immediately silenced himself, clearing his throat and sniffling absentmindedly. "Oh, I sorry—'Somepony' is just such an odd word. Replacing 'one' and 'body' in pronouns with 'pony'…" The Doctor's sentence trailed off into another burst of laughter.

Dash narrowed her eyes at the strange pony in front of her, frustration buzzing in the back of her skull. "Listen, _Doctor—_what's going on here?"

The Doctor immediately stopped laughing, but retained a smile on his face. "Oh, you know, just the usual for me—saving the world and what not. Now, tell me a little about ponies. Obviously, there are at least two kinds: ones without wings, like me, and ones with, like you." A chuckle bubbled up from his chest again. "Are there unicorns, too?" He joked.

Dash stared at the stranger with her mouth hanging open, dumbfounded. "Are you an idiot?" She asked, backing away a few paces after she had regained her senses. This pony didn't seem… stable.

The Doctor blinked, unfazed. "I don't think I am. Am I?" He asked to nobody in particular. _Nopony, I suppose it is, _he thought bemusedly to himself. The Doctor began looking up, a look of concern flashing across his face before it was replaced by a look of pure amusement. Dash followed his gaze and, though she would have previously thought it impossible, her jaw dropped another inch or two. "Fascinating," he whispered. "Snow in the middle of summer. Real snow. Does this happen normally?"

The blue pegasus simply shook her head, too surprised and confused.

The Doctor caught a snowflake on one of his front hooves. He squinted at it carefully, and then breathed on it softly enough that it wouldn't blow away. To his surprise, it didn't melt; it just quivered a little bit and then grew a fraction of an inch in size. "That's not good," he muttered, again not to anypony in particular. "Erm, does there happen to be a type of pony that uses natural or artificial electrochemical energy to remotely move and manipulate objects and teleport between places and times?" His ears flattened back against his skull when he noticed that Dash was looking at him like his head was screwed on backwards. He looked up and flicked them back and forth; _Swiveling ears, _he thought to himself with an inward grin. _Fascinating._

"Uhm… unicorns can do magic, if that's what you mean."

"Close enough. Are these ponies required for important tasks around town and, possibly, the world?"

"The princesses raise and lower the sun and moon. Without their magic, both would go all over the place."

"That's, erm… That's not good. Where are said princesses?"

"They're in Canterlot, why?" Dash cocked her head.

"Because I need to talk to them. Allons-y!"

**~…~**

Spike trudged through the fake snow, muttering expletives to himself. The fluffy white powder was up to his waist. "Of all the creatures I chosen to occupy, I get one without wings," he muttered, a thin trail of smoke wafting from his nostrils as he fumed.

He weaved through the dark, still-quiet streets of Canterlot, making his way outside the city and towards the imposing cliff face that the citadel itself was attached to. Where the supports met the cliff face, there was a small, covered pavilion with stairs coming off of either side of it: one running up to the top of the cliff, and one running down to the bottom where the ocean met the rock face.

The climb itself wasn't extremely long—the staircase itself was about two hundred yards long—but it was steep. About halfway up, Spike was already out of breath. He belched nervously a few times, muttering something incoherent to himself.

Finally, after nearly a half hour of climbing (and, at the end, crawling), Spike reached the top of the mountain. There, three ponies—a red pegasus, a blue unicorn, and a purple earth pony—stood in a small semicircle, chatting idly with each other.

"Brothers, sisters…" Spike greeted, his arms spread wide in greeting. "It's time. The bioelectrical inhibitors have been dropped from space onto the entire planet, and all of the natives are powerless to stop us." He grinned.

**~…~ **

"Ah-ha! That's the thing that I saw making that flashy light and grinding noise!" Dash shouted, pointing a hoof at a large blue box. "Police public call box," it read across the top. It looked fairly out of place in the middle of the woods, but for some reason, it just seemed to… fit. Like she could glance at it and it would be able to completely fly under her radar. She shook her head and squinted at it; she couldn't seem to keep her focus on it for very long.

"Low-level perception filter," the Doctor said, stopping and leaning against the blue box. "It could be on the side of the road somewhere that it's never been before and people wouldn't notice that it's there, nor will they notice when it's _not_ there the next day."

Dash blinked.

"It makes you _not _notice it," he clarified, rolling his eyes and fumbling with a handle on the side of it.

"Oh, okay. So… what's it do? Besides make noise and flash lights, of course."

The Doctor pushed the door open and walked inside, motioning with his head for her to follow it. "In good time, Miss. Come along—we don't have very much time."

Dash raised an eyebrow. "In… there?" She asked, pointing a hoof, but he had already walked inside and shut the door behind him. Slowly, she walked up to it and pushed the door open.

"What."

She shut the door and ran around the box once, tapping on all four sides, and ran back to the front, opening the door and looking around inside again.

"_What._"

Dash ran outside and flew up to the top of the box, peering into the light bulb at the top and looking into the windows to the inside (not that she saw anything; the glass was frosted). She glided down in front of the box and sat down in front of it, trying to make sense of it.

The Doctor opened the door and poked his head out. "Are you coming, Miss… I'm sorry; you still haven't told me your name."

"Rainbow Dash," she said, still sitting on the ground in front of the blue box. "That… it's…"

The Doctor nodded, obviously fighting a smirk. "It's bigger on the inside, yes. I'd explain it for you, but it's very complicated and … erm… timey-wimey. Now, we need to go if we're going." He withdrew his head and closed the door.

"R-right. Yeah. Into the impossible blue box. Away we go," Dash said hesitantly, opening the blue door and stepping into impossibility.


End file.
